(May 7, 1931-April 14, 2019)
Born in New York City, New York
Science fiction/fantasy author
Book series include ‘Book of the New Sun’ (four titles, 1980-83), ‘Book of the Long Sun’ (4 titles, 1994-96), and ‘Book of the Short Sun’ (three titles, 1999-2001)
Also wrote ‘The Fifth Head of Cerberus’ (1972) and ‘Peace’ (1975)

Why he might be annoying

Isaac Asimov mistakenly announced him as the winner of the 1971 Nebula Award for best short story. (Actually, no winner was chosen for the category that year.)
A critic said of his magnum opus, ‘Book of the New Sun,’ ‘far more people own a copy than have read it all the way through.’
He throws incredibly obscure words into his writing: cataphract, fuligin, metamynodon, etc.

Why he might not be annoying

He was married to his wife Rosemary for 61 years.
He served as a combat engineer in the Korean War.
Before becoming a full-time writer, he was an industrial engineer at Proctor and Gamble, where he helped design the machinery to make Pringles.
In a poll by Locus magazine, ‘The Book of the New Sun’ ranked as the third greatest fantasy book, behind only J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and ‘The Hobbit.’
His writing was praised by Ursula K. Le Guin (‘Wolfe is our Melville’), Neil Gaiman (‘the finest living male writer of SF and fantasy – possibly the finest living American writer’) and George R.R. Martin (‘a magnificent writer – one of the best our genre has ever produced’).